Product Review: Wafer Cake

Whether it’s baked milk or pickled tomatoes, Russian and Eastern European grocery stores are filled with mysterious and sometimes delicious foodstuffs. In this occasional series, I review the good, the bad and the weird.

I saved this post especially for March 8, International Women's Day. In Soviet Russia--and, I suppose, to this day--March 8 is an all-purpose women's holiday, a mix of Valentine's Day and Mother's Day. If you're from Russia, this chocolate wafer cake is a totally appropriate gift for the women in your life--along with a bouquet of mimosas, the traditional flowers for this holiday.

You wouldn’t think that a wafer “cake” (wafel’ni tort/вафельный торт) is anything special, but, according to my mom, getting your hands on one was a pretty big deal in the Soviet times.

This cake is basically a big wafer, usually covered in chocolate, and always sold in a cardboard box. The brand in the photo is called Kapriz (каприз)--that is, "caprice"!

The best versions of wafer cake crisp and fresh, and aren’t bad with a cup of tea or coffee. To serve, slice into neat square or rectangles, like a good Russian hostess.

For a guide to Russian/Eastern European stores in the Milwaukee area that sell this kind of thing, see my shopping guides.

Russian Candy Review: Korovki

This is part three of my occasional Russian candy review series. See also part one and part two.

Who’s up for a little cow? That’s what these caramel candies are called in Russian—Korovki, which is short for little cows, plural (коровки=little cows/корова=cow, singular/коровы=cows, presumably full-sized).

They come in bright little wrappers with a picture of a blissfully happy cow on the front. As for the taste, these are like a soft, creamy version of Werther’s butterscotch toffee. They’re a bit too sweet for my tastes, but work when I need sugar rush. I give them a B-.

You can buy Korovki at most Russian and Eastern European groceries. In the Milwaukee area, I recommend Spartak in Whitefish Bay. For more on Milwaukee-area shopping options, check out this guide.

Russian Candy Review: Part Two

In Russia, you eat the bear. Oh, okay, you actually eat Mishka Kosolapyi (мишка косолапый), which translates as "clumsy bear," more or less. This is basically a chocolate-covered wafer candy with a picture of a mama bear and cubs on the wrapper. Cute, crunchy and tasty; I give it an A.

This is the second installment of my long-ago promised series on Russian candy (part one is here). You can buy mishkas at most Russian and Eastern-European grocery stores in Milwaukee; go here for locations. Yulinka Cooks endorses Spartak in Whitefish Bay, Wis.

Some Notes on Russian Cookbooks

Move over, Please to the Table; I’ve got a new Russian cookbook to play with. It's Anne Volokh’s 600-page The Art of Russian Cuisine, published in 1983. (Anya Von Bremzen’s 1990 Please to the Table, by the way, has been my main inspiration for this blog.)

I haven’t had a chance to try any of Volokh’s recipes, but I’m impressed by the scope of her book. All the usual Russian foods (borsch, pelmeni) are well-represented, but so are lesser-known dishes such as seledka pod shuboi (herring in a fur coat) and Napoleon (tricky but popular layered cream cake). The chapters on making your own rye bread and pickling and preserving fruits and vegetables are extensive. Volokh’s recipes are more detailed than Von Bremzen’s, and she included handy diagrams for work-intensive dishes such as vareneki (dumplings) and multi-layered pies.

If there’s a downside to the book, it’s that Volokh spends a bit too much time on 19th-century Russian haute cuisine. (The amusing author photo in my edition shows Volokh wearing what looks like a 19th-century hat and gown.) Has anyone in Russia cooked dishes like poached sturgeon with cream sauce and Veal Prince Orlov between, say, 1920 and 1995? There’s little from the former Soviet republics with the exception of the most well-known dishes like plov, the Uzbek lamb and rice stew.

Von Bremzen, too, includes grouse and such in her book, but she also extensively covers the foods of every USSR satellite nation from Estonia to Tajikistan. I like that she notes Soviet-era food shortages and adaptations 20th-century home cooks have had to make. Unfortunately, Von Bremzen's recipes often need some tweaking and her ingredient proportions tend to be off.

I've heard from blog readers that Volokh's recipes are more precise, so I'm looking forward to perusing her book and trying some of her recipes, starting with pickled mushrooms.